


One Line Writing Prompts

by tautochrying



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Angst, M/M, Mentions of Blood, Nightmares, Panicking, possible death, worrying
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-11-08
Updated: 2016-11-08
Packaged: 2018-08-29 20:10:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,116
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8503714
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tautochrying/pseuds/tautochrying





	1. "...Everything hurts."

The phone on the side table let out a loud ring, startling the person that was sitting nearby to it. For a second, all Dave could register was the loud sound and the want to cease it. Sure he knew whoever was calling him probably had something important to say, most of his friends knew how much he sucked at making phone calls. He never knew when to end the call, never realized it was time to just stop talking and hang up. Eventually almost everyone figured this out, at least the ones that wouldn’t just hang up whenever they felt it necessary to do so.  
Karkat was one of the people that would hang up when he felt the need, hence why a bit of Dave’s curiosity died with seeing the contact name on the phone’s screen. He’d never deny a call from Karkat, for the most part. Dave picked up the phone and placed it to his ear, pushing his glasses up as he prepared to speak.  
“Hey Karkat. Haven’t heard from you in a while, what’s up?” Dave was completely calm, if not a bit happy to be on the phone with Karkat.  
Karkat seemed oddly quiet on the other end of the call, that already sent red flags up in Dave’s mind. “H-hey Dave, this is probably going to sound about seventy kinds of fucking stupid without any context, but there's something I want to tell you.”  
“Yeah?” Dave found the word leaving him even before the concern and the confusion could even begin to fully hit him with their impact. He gave a nervous chuckle. “Karkat, you know you can say stuff without dramatic bullshit intertwined into it.”  
A cough sounded before any words actually did, from the sound of it it was more than uncomfortable. “I want you to know I love you, okay? You mean the entire fucking universe to me Strider, don't forget it.”  
That's when it hit him. Karkat’s voice, the way he was phrasing everything in general. He wouldn't remember when he moved up to haphazardly get everything absolutely necessary before heading out of the door of his apartment. It only took seconds for his to start picking up the pace, trying to manage talking as he moved so quickly.  
“Karkat, are you okay? I mean this shit with every ounce of shitty flavoring mix I own so you better not lie to me.” He waited for a response, eyebrows furrowing behind his glasses as he started heading in the vague direction of where he thought Karkat might be. Managing to actually get a location, thank you to those tracking programs Karkat managed so everyone could find each other, Dave started walking faster.  
Nearly a whole minute and no response. Just endless walking, walking that turned to running, running that turned into dave doing his best to hold a phone to his ear while sprinting. He never hung up, just made sure he was going in the right direction and ran. Eventually he got close, close enough that he could speak and have a chance of Karkat hearing him.  
“Vantas? Where the hell are you,” he had hung up, cupping his hands around his mouth. As soon as he heard a noise in response he turned towards it, eyes widening at the sight that he was met with.  
Immediately, Dave ran towards Karkat’s collapsed figure on the ground, clutching his sides as if his life depended on it. Judging by what Dave could see, Karkat’s life might actually depend on such a thing.  
The troll shook, coughing again, weakly looking at Dave when the other gently scooped him up into his arms. Karkat winced as well, curling in on himself. “I already called an ambulance, I'm not that stupid.” His voice sounded quieter, weaker, worse than one may have ever actually heard it.  
Dave felt his eyes watering, his face heating up as he just stared. Karkat’s blood was on his hands, getting on his clothes, already pooled slightly on the ground. It seemed like a fair bit, but not terrible just yet, but even Dave would say it was a concerning amount. He couldn't manage much, just a bunch of mumbles about how Karkat would be fine, how he'd make it, how he'd be alive and Dave wouldn't let it go any other way. Most of all, wondering why this happened, how it happened. Dave was almost more of a mess than Karkat.  
After a while of Dave's rambling, none of which Karkat could answer to, the troll felt himself coughing again. Sharp pains radiating from his abdomen and his chest, shooting in every direction to the point that even the sound of approaching sirens couldn't break him out of the pained daze.  
He tucked his head down, pressing it against Dave's shoulder as he let the words slip out of his mouth, a mere whisper amongst everything else going on. “...Everything hurts.”

 

 


	2. "Don't leave me."

Dave never exactly was the type to sleep well, or sleep through any large amount of commotion in general. Maybe that's why he found himself pushing himself up from off the surface of his bed at what he knew was an ungodly hour of the night. There was too much noise in the room over, too much muffled cursing that was loud enough to even get through the walls in the first place. He only knew one person of the sort, one person who could speak that loudly without even trying.   
It wasn't entirely too long before Dave found himself sighing and moving to swing his legs over the side of the bed, muttering to himself about waking up in the first place. How was a guy supposed to get some decent sleep when the person in the room over was an extreme insomniac and practically the shoutiest person you'll ever happen to come across? Admittedly, Dave wasn't entirely too fond of Karkat’s sleep schedule. From what he knew it was rightfully concerning, even by a troll’s standards. Days without sleep never seemed entirely good for anyone, regardless of species or amount of arguing on the matter.   
Maybe that was why he was dragging his groggy ass out of bed, to the door, into the hall. Because of Karkat, because of Karkat’s damned sleep habits and how much they concerned the Strider.   
It wasn't like he fretted over it, but it didn't mean he was entirely fond of it. Watching the other slowly descend into the mess he became when he went longer and longer without sleep wasn't pleasant, it gave him this small twinging feeling of concern that near always ends up snowballing into flurries of worry concealed by a pair of glasses and a weakly held up demeanor of indifference.   
He let his shoulders stay slumped with the feeling he could only label as sleep still weighing over him, grazing his hand across his desk to find his glasses before sliding them on his face. For a moment he lingered, running a hair through his hair to make some form of an attempt to not look like he just got dive bombed by a bird with the intention of fucking up any form of order in someone's hair.  
It wasn't like presentation mattered, it was just force of habit that his half asleep, 4:56 in the morning self still registered. At least he was near fully awake by the time he closed the short distance from his door to Karkat’s, though being awake wasn't exactly going to aid him in seeing in the dark of the meteor, even without the glasses.   
It took about a second of listening for something, anything, because Karkat never just went silent, before Dave decided to actually knock on the door. Who would have guessed all he was met with was more silence, if not the vague sound of a single muffled word. The fact all of this silence was right after a lot of loud and seemingly distressed cursing wasn't helping matters at all either.   
Dave sighed, although it was more or less just him huffing lightly through his nostrils. A small bit of annoyance he couldn't hold up too properly, everything just seemed so off about the situation. “Karkat, I know you're in there, don't try and pull some weird alien card or some shit. It's far too early for that type of bullshit anyway.”  
No response. About a whole minute, and he would know, he monitored the time as it passed almost as some little subconscious act, and there was no response.   
“Dude, please help me avoid being the biggest ass in the history of paradox space and just let me in. I'm like a friendly neighborhood vampire, gotta invite me in or there will be some form of minor hell to pay. Most likely just an uninvited dude in your house.”  
Once more, silence. Dave would be wearing a barefaced lie if he claimed he wasn't worried in any way, well, that was until he picked up on the sound of rustling of what he could only assume was blankets. Even the smallest sign of the other heading towards the door had Dave composing himself, not like he needed to straighten out his expression anyway, it hardly took any work for that anymore. Seemingly deadpanned expressions came a bit easy when glasses blocked the oh so obvious look in his eyes, not to mention eyebrow positioning.   
Half of his face wasn't the important bit of the matter at hand however, Dave’s main focus was the troll that just opened the door, trying to figure out what was wrong before even attempting to ask. Part of him didn't even want to attempt asking, partially wary of getting caught red handed with his concern. The other bits of him knew how Karkat got with being upset at this point. Anyone who managed to be around the troll when he was upset could quickly learn he would redirect anything to not answer whether or not he was okay, even if there were just a few exceptions.   
Silence was smothering sure, for lack of better words. Almost as if the feeling of wanting to say something was radiating from each respective person, yet neither actually could find words to say, much less actually get what they were thinking out. At the very least you could say that was Dave’s case, he had something to say but uncertainty held it back.  
On the other hand, Karkat could hardly grasp words, he knew that if he attempted to say something his voice would be too off anyways. He seemed exhausted, worn out to the point that his expression was near completely just tired. Borderline annoyed, though that part was too obviously forced for his own comfort.   
One thing about Dave was that he hated silence, practically any form of it really. It's the reason he wore headphones most of the time, hell sometimes he even had to fall asleep with some form of music or noise playing. At least he was starting to get out of that little bit, silent meteor equals getting used to weird empty places. The lack of noise felt deafening at times, hence why he made his best attempt to break it first.   
“So,” he stalled a bit, dragging out the word for extra thinking time. “Did some shit drop on you or something? You were cursing pretty fucking loud back there.”  
Karkat was at least glad he wasn't the one who had started this out, simply because he couldn't think. When he did speak he couldn't shake the quietness, he never really could after think type of shit happens anyway. “I just, passed out for a while. It's no big deal.”   
Dave, once more, found himself emerged into concern of sorts, mixed with a fair bit of confusion. “What? So you're just all weird because you woke up, didn't you like straight up fall out of your bed, I heard a metric FUCK ton of cursing through the wall.”  
Karkat crossed his arms, looking down at his feet for a couple of moments. It was better than staring more at Dave. “Yeah, whatever your happy ass wants to think Strider.”   
“I can just, go then, if you want to get back to sleep.”  
That's when Karkat's gaze jerked back up, his face morphing into sheer panic of all things. He did try to push it down however, tried to stay calmer. He didn't manage to get his eyebrows furrowed back to a more Karkat-like state. All that was even in his voice when he spoke again was fright. A whisper more than anything when the words left him. “Don't leave me..”

 

 


End file.
